A large, original unit designation reading “1^st / BATTERY.” is painted in red on the back flap of this wood frame knapsack. Volunteer, militia and even regular army troops carried a variety of knapsacks during the Civil War and the years around it. This is one of several different types of rigid “hard packs.” Constructed of leather, canvas, oil cloth and tarred canvas tacked to a wood frame, this retains parts of its leather shoulder straps and blanket roll straps, and the sling hook is still in place on the bottom. The box and frame itself are still very much intact. The outer flap is tarred leather, the underside of which is lined with plain canvas. The bottom edge of this stuck to the lower inside edge of the frame, which was tarred, and in opening it at some point pieces of the lower edge of the lining tore out, some of which still adhere to the bottom edge of the frame. The majority of it, however, is still in place, lining the flap. On the inside, the box is closed with two oilcloth flaps that fastened together at top and bottom with striped cloth ties, three of which are intact and one is torn from its base. From the remnants of the fittings on the top of the pack, it had three blanket roll straps and was closed by two leather straps that must have run down the exterior of the back and buckled on the bottom of the pack. The upper pieces of the shoulder yoke system are still riveted to the top center of the pack as it would ride against the wearer’s back. The edges of the pack show wear. The inner edge of the pack as it would rest against the wearer’s right arm has a vertical tear exposing the wood frame. The bottom of the pack shows wear at tow corners, also exposing the wood.  Interior is stenciled “83”.

The unit designation obviously makes the piece and it would display well with artillery material. The use of red paint for the unit designation is appropriate for artillery and fits with the designation of the unit as a battery. Which “First Battery” it belonged to is tough to answer since in addition to regiments of artillery many states had independent batteries of artillery simply numbered in sequence. Regardless of that, most knapsacks available to collectors are either unused surplus or lack unit markings entirely. Artillery marked packs are especially scarce.  [sr]

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